1 year

"I am ashamed to be here today, and I accept full responsibility for my actions," Rowland told U.S. District Judge Peter Dorsey.

In addition to the prison time, to be served starting April 1 in a federal prison in Massachusetts, Rowland was sentenced to four months in home confinement and three years of supervised release. He was ordered to pay an $82,000 fine and perform 300 hours of community service.

Serving time in prison is not easy, so even a year in prison will be difficult for the former governor. But the sentence was surprisingly light, considering what Rowland did to Connecticut.

He turned state government into a criminal enterprise to benefit himself and the state contractors who supplied him with "gifts."

He has never really taken responsibility for what he did. Despite his contrition in court, for example, his lawyer sent the judge a legal memorandum before the sentencing in which Rowland blamed others for his troubles.

Rowland reached a plea bargain with federal prosecutors last December, agreeing to plead guilty to one corruption charge.

He admitted accepting $107,000 in charter airplane trips to Las Vegas and renovations to his Bantam Lake cottage from companies that received state tax benefits and contracts in return.

Under the plea agreement, Rowland faced at least 15 months to 21 months in prison, so the judge gave him a break.

Rowland was especially lucky to find a lenient judge because, as charged by prosecutors, he lied to federal probation officials about his assets.

Turns out Rowland isn't almost broke, as he claimed to probation officials. He has a $416,000 retirement account he didn't mention.

The deal prosecutors made with Rowland set the stage for this lenient sentence. There was evidence of wrongdoing well beyond the free cottage renovations and free trips to Las Vegas. But prosecutors stopped their investigation, once Rowland accepted the plea bargain.

In recent days, prosecutors seemed to be suffering from buyer's remorse especially when they learned Rowland has been working for a state contractor as a "consultant" and making inappropriate contacts with state officials for the contractor.

Prosecutors were so angry they asked the judge to go beyond the plea agreement and give Rowland three years in prison.

But the judge showed compassion to Rowland.

It was more compassion than someone who wasn't an ex-governor would receive for similar crimes.

And it was certainly more compassion than Rowland has shown to the people of Connecticut.